tohiragana

Convert Japanese (Kanji / Katakana) and English text to Hiragana. Zero API keys required.

Installation

npm install tohiragana

Quick Start

const { ToHiragana } = require('tohiragana');

const converter = new ToHiragana();
await converter.init(); // Initialize the morphological analyzer (one-time)

// Japanese → Hiragana
await converter.fromJapanese('漢字を入力');   // => 'かんじをにゅうりょく'
await converter.fromJapanese('カタカナ');     // => 'かたかな'

// English → Japanese meaning → Hiragana
await converter.fromEnglishTranslate('Apple'); // => 'りんご'

// English pronunciation → Hiragana (synchronous, no init needed)
converter.fromEnglishPhonetic('Apple');         // => 'あっぷる'

API Reference

new ToHiragana()

Creates a new converter instance.

converter.init(): Promise<void>

Initializes the internal morphological analyzer (kuromoji). Must be called once before using fromJapanese() or fromEnglishTranslate().

converter.isReady: boolean

Returns true if init() has completed.

converter.fromJapanese(text): Promise<string>

Converts Japanese text (Kanji, Katakana, or mixed) to Hiragana.

await converter.fromJapanese('東京タワー');  // => 'とうきょうたわー'

converter.fromEnglishTranslate(text): Promise<string>

Translates English text to Japanese and returns it in Hiragana. Uses the free Google Translate endpoint (no API key required).

await converter.fromEnglishTranslate('Good morning'); // => 'おはようございます'

converter.fromEnglishPhonetic(text): string

Converts English text to its Japanese phonetic representation in Hiragana. This is a synchronous method — no init() required.

converter.fromEnglishPhonetic('Coffee'); // => 'こっふぇえ'

converter.convert(text, options?): Promise<string>

Auto-detect or specify conversion mode.

// Auto-detect (default)
await converter.convert('漢字');           // => 'かんじ'
await converter.convert('Hello');          // => translated to Japanese hiragana

// Explicit mode
await converter.convert('Apple', { mode: 'translate' });  // => 'りんご'
await converter.convert('Apple', { mode: 'phonetic' });   // => 'あっぷる'
await converter.convert('漢字',  { mode: 'japanese' });   // => 'かんじ'

Modes: 'auto' (default), 'japanese', 'translate', 'phonetic'

ToHiragana.katakanaToHiragana(str): string

Static utility. Converts all Katakana characters in a string to Hiragana.

ToHiragana.katakanaToHiragana('カタカナ'); // => 'かたかな'

License

MIT